Saturday, October 31, 2009

Music and Dance

I sense a ramble coming on.

Just had the thought about how people constantly compare the good old days of music to the "trash of today". Classical aficionados frowned upon jazzing wailers, jazzing wailers frowned upon guitar-wielding rockers, guitar-wielding rockers frowned upon disco dancers, disco dancers frowned upon 90s poppers, 90s poppers frowned upon techno bobbers.

At this rate, I am almost certain of the day when our generation reminisces nostalgically about the "good old days of Crazy Frog".
"Tell me 'bout it, music never was the same after that age was it?"
"Everything sounds like a lightsaber battle nowadays."
"Fucked up."

The truth is, our lives are just really long photographs, exposed for 80 years to create the most amazing image ever seen. But a photograph is after all only a single capture of a particular time, whether it's 10 milliseconds or 10 decades. It won't move with the fourth dimension, and so similarly, to oversimplify it, it is very hard for us to do so as well. The speed of the advancement of technologies today has helped us get more used and be more open to constant (if rather irritating) changes in cultures, paradigms, norms and... well unnorms. But we will have to accept that because of the numerous influences we have been so deeply steeped in through our lives, there will be some changes that will unsettle us, even if it's only for awhile. And we also have to accept that just as we rebelled against our parents by secretly listening to rock, metal, techno, rap or R&B, future generations will be wholly convinced of their love of whatever trend comes up from the ground, and short of leaving our kids to slowly rot, we must try as much not to interfere with it, for who are we to say what is good art and what is not? And after all, how will you advance but by breaking boundaries and comfort zones?

Just don't play your crap on my expensive sound system. :)

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